Hanna Knyazyeva-Minenko misses out on triple jump medal

Hanna Knyazyeva-Minenko jumped a season’s best distance, though it wasn’t enough to see her claim a medal in London on Monday evening.

Reaching the final by jumping a previous season best of 14.17 in Saturday’s qualifying heat, the Ukrainian-born 27-year-old reached the second round of Monday night’s final, but fell well short of claiming a top-three finish – missing out on a bronze medal by 35cm.

Disappointed with her overall finish, she told Jewish News: “I’m not happy, it’s been very hard here for me because of the injuries I’ve had this year which didn’t allow me to perform 100 percent here.”

The first round of the final saw the 12 participants each have three attempts, with the leading eight going on to have another three attempts to determine the gold, silver and bronze winners.

Knyazyeva-Minenko’s first attempt saw her register 14.11 which left her in seventh place overall, and she then followed that up with an attempt of 14.04, which left her seventh overall going into the final round of jumps in the first round. She saved her best till last – with an attempt – and new season best – of 14.29 which saw her qualify for the second part of the final in fifth place.

Looking to close in on third spot, she fouled her first attempt, though was much more impressive with her fifth attempt – clearing 14.42 to claim another season best, which saw her move up into fourth spot. However, her fifth and final attempt saw her jump 13.97, ensuring she finished the tournament in fourth place.

She did though enjoy competing at the tournament and was grateful for the support she received inside the London Stadium, which she said helped spur her on. “The atmosphere the people made here, to have the support of Israeli fans and see the Israeli flag in the crowd was great – their support helped me and gave me more energy”, she said. “I hope I can now go on and perform better, it would be great to compete injury-free.”